Metroid: Other M both will, and won’t, be the game that people are expecting.
Metroid: Other M will be a unique take on the franchise and on the lead character Samus Aran, say designers Yoshio Sakamoto and Yosuke Hayashi. Nintendo’s Sakamoto said that long-time fans will find plenty to enjoy, but that it’s not just business as usual for the series.
“While we’re trying to do these things that people have been clamoring for, we also don’t want to do things the way people expect, because then there’s no surprise,” he said. “On top of that, we have to make it accessible for anybody to play.”
The pair describe the Metroid series as “lonely” games, and say that that’s one thing that Other M will play with: “I think the essential Metroid design is something that’s very beautiful, but in each game, I think it’s had a slightly different manifestation,” said Team Ninja’s Hayashi. “For example, if you think about Super Metroid, that was a game that was really characterized by silence.”
“I think a lot of people who have been playing Metroid certainly have developed an idea of Samus as a loner,” he acknowledged. “It certainly seems hard to get a sense that Samus would ever work with team members,” added Sakamoto. “But because that image is so prevalent, we’ve decided to play with it a little bit. So you’ll find that she does have team members fighting alongside her, but, at the same time, the focus, from the narrative perspective, is going to always be on what she’s thinking. We want people to get to know Samus this time around.”
From the trailers we’ve seen so far, Other M looks like a pretty solid Metroid title from a gameplay point of view, and it will be interesting to see how a more prominent narrative will gel with the series. Metroid: Other M is release on August 31st.
Source: Eurogamer
